


Midnight Special

by inbox



Series: Psychic Load [5]
Category: Cable (Comics), Marvel (Comics), Marvel 616, Punisher (Comics)
Genre: Bruises, Canon-Typical Violence, Food, Hand Jobs, M/M, Minor Injuries, Mutant Politics, Mutant Powers, Oral Sex, Rough Oral Sex, Sexual Fantasy, Size Difference, Teasing, Telepathic Sex, Telepathy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-20
Updated: 2020-02-20
Packaged: 2021-02-27 22:54:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,244
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22813417
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inbox/pseuds/inbox
Summary: “I've got something you're really, really going to enjoy seeing,” says Cable, unbuckling his gear. His big boxy face, normally so stern and patrician, is lit with an expression of genuine excitement, tinged with a layer of smugness that Frank has come to appreciate with time. Frank looks at him and feels his guts take a pleasurable lazy loop, a shiver of something pleasurable and secret and entirely unlike the roiling post-teleportation nausea he’s also experiencing.Late night kebabs and handjobs by the water. Sounds like a date.
Relationships: Frank Castle/Nathan Summers
Series: Psychic Load [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1367605
Comments: 12
Kudos: 38





	Midnight Special

**Author's Note:**

  * For [SenkoWakimarin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SenkoWakimarin/gifts).



Sleeping in a shitty sidewalk salvage recliner isn’t the most restful place Frank’s ever taken a kip on, but with a set of with six day-old cracked ribs and a bruised kidney that keeps dumping blood into his piss, it sure as shit beats sleeping on the thin mattress that came with his quote unquote furnished apartment, paid for in cash by Lucas Gaol and signed for with an X in blue ballpoint.

It’s not a great sleeping spot but he _is_ asleep, and has been for hours, with a three quarters finished Quest bar half-melted on the armrest and a foil tray of Oxy within grabbing distance. 

Frank is asleep. Then, a split second later, Frank is wide awake. There's a new presence in his shitty little Harlem walkup and primal instinct is prickling the back of his neck, even through the milky film of painkillers dulling his reaction.

_Someone is in his apartment._

Some stupid fucking putz is in his goddamn kitchen, and Frank is in a shitty enough mood to make their life extra fuckin’ miserable.

Whoever it is oughta thank their lucky stars Frank is too beat up and too deep in the opioid fog to do anything other than shoot them, ‘cause if he had to get up outta his chair and break their neck personally then he's gonna be in a _real_ shitty mood about it. 

Frank silently reaches down the side of his recliner to the piece he keeps between the shabby cushion. His fingers touch the hog-leg revolver, curl around the sticky finger grips, easing it up nice and gentle as he keeps his breathing steady. 

The intruder bumps into the card table he keeps to the side of his kitchen bench, sending a handful of empty shell casings rattling to the floor. 

_Got you, shithead,_ thinks Frank. _Know exactly where you are._ He exhales low through his mouth and draws a bead at the wall, right where the old horsehair plaster is hanging on the frame by hope and history. A bullet will punch straight through it, even something as slow as this Saturday night special Frank took off a dumbass kid three weeks back. 

The click of the hammer cocking back sounds deafening loud in the quiet apartment. 

More parts of Frank’s ammo press hit the linoleum, rolling and scattering.

“Bright fucking Lady,” says a voice from the kitchen. “When did you put this here?”

“Mother _fucker,”_ says Frank, loud. “Summers, you stupid son of a bitch.” He flicks on the table lamp and lowers his revolver, scowling at the big man now blinking owlish in the arched kitchen door. “I nearly plugged you.”

Cable looks undisturbed by his near brush with death. He braces his hands against the door frame and stretches forward, looking intently at Frank. “S’good look for you. Naked and holding a gun.” He ignores Frank's scoff, raising one thick eyebrow at the threadbare burgundy corduroy recliner Frank dragged off the sidewalk last month. “You, uh, sleep there often?”

“Does it matter,” he snaps defensively, shoving his piece back between the cushions. “How did you get in?”

“Frank. C’mon.” 

Cable adjusts a strap on his chest and Frank notices the bulky rectangular frame of Cable's hard light gun behind his shoulder, the sweat matting down his hair, the thin cut on his eyebrow. He's been on the job, cracking skulls somewhere in the world. For a brief second Frank feels faintly disappointed he wasn't with him, then quickly squashes that thought down into the dirt where it belongs. 

The door frame creaks warningly as Cable leans into another stretch. The thin shirt he's wearing does nothing to hide the way the thick muscle tenses across his chest, tendons straining into his shoulders. Frank drinks it in, looking his fill before dragging his eyeline up to meet Cable’s smug knowing expression. So sue him. He likes to look at Cable, Cable likes being looked at. 

“I've got something you’ll want to see.”

“How did you get in? You could've tripped the front door, could've--”

Cable just looks at him ‘til Frank puts two and two together. 

“Goddamnit,” he mutters. “That's a boundary. You text first next time. Don't teleport here unannounced.”

“Next time,” he says soothingly, and holds up his hands in a placating manner when Frank tartly tells him to go fuck himself. “Time is of the essence though. We need to go right now. Is that Turkish place still down the street?”

Frank, gingerly hauling himself upright and working on autopilot, nods then says _what?_ as his brain finally catches up. 

“Nadas, right? They do good falafel. Don't gear up,” he says, as Frank limps last him and reaches for the empty ballistic vest hanging limp from the back of a folding chair, still damp from a much-needed kitchen sink wash. “I'd say keep naked, but…”

“Summers.” Frank pinches his nose, breathing in and out as deep as his ribs will allow. “What do you want?”

“Falafel wrap with eggplant and garlic sauce,” he says promptly. “And to show you something.”

“Do I need to bring anything with me?”

“Money,” Cable says. “Now that you mention it.” He laughs awkwardly and pats his bandolier of pouches uselessly as Frank scowls at him. “Where did you park last?”

It's a nice night out, balmy and still. Frank opts for a pair of ratty sweats and a sleep-stale Nets tank, fishing both off the top of from the basket of laundry sitting in the corner of the kitchen and pulling them on with mindful care of his aches. The laundry has been piling up during Frank's reluctant convalescence, waiting for him to get his shit together enough to babysit a few quarters worth of loads - some unremarkable, some biohazards, most of them evidence - and if Cable is gonna be an uncooperative asshole, then he's just gonna have to deal with Frank smelling like old takeout spills and slept-in clothes. 

“Slow down,” he says as Cable steps towards the front door. “Don't touch that, you’ll--”

“Bodyslide by two.” 

He feels the delicate press of Cable in his brain right as the world compresses to nothing for a brief sickening second, twisting reality in an incomprehensible knot before spitting him out onto the sidewalk by Frank's unassuming pickup truck. 

“Christ,” Frank says, too loud through the pressure popping in his ears. “Mother _fucker_.” He clutches at his ribs and wheezes, thinking way too hard about the residual urge to vomit he feels whenever Cable says his magic catchphrase and yanks Frank halfway across the world. Or, in this case, four blocks from his apartment, the closest spot Frank's been able to find in weeks. 

“What,” he says through gritted teeth, “Is the goddamn rush?”

“I've got something you're really, really going to enjoy seeing,” says Cable, unbuckling his straps and dropping his pouches onto the truck’s worn bench seat. His big boxy face, normally so stern and patrician, is lit with an expression of genuine excitement, tinged with a layer of smugness that Frank has come to appreciate with time. Frank looks at him as Cable does… _something_ to his gun, rendering it small enough to drop in the footwell, and feels his guts take a pleasurable lazy loop, a shiver of something pleasurable and secret and entirely unlike the roiling post-teleportation nausea he’s also experiencing. 

Just ‘cause he's… he's _okay_ with Nathan Summers, Frank thinks, doesn't mean he’s obligated to find him anything other than a gigantic pain in the ass at all times. 

“You'll love it,” says Cable again, before he cusses under his breath and slaps the hood of the truck with a solid clunk of metal against metal. “We forgot the food,” he says, and before Frank can get a word out as to whether there was any ‘we’ in that sentence, says his dumb catchphrase and the world falls away again.

This time they appear in the alley behind Nadas, and Frank takes a certain grim pleasure in coughing up over Cable’s size 16s. “I hate you,” he says, holding his ribs. “Christ, I fucking despise you.”

“Better out than in,” says Cable cheerfully, patting him on the shoulder. “You’ll get used to it eventually. Body sliding.”

“I fucking won't,” croaks Frank. “Refuse.”

“At least we're not time jumping; if this is how a short linear slide affects you, you’d probably throw up everything you've eaten since 1998 if I started taking you through time.” He reaches down and rubs mindless at Frank's back, heavy on his spine. “Hope still throws up every few trips. You're in esteemed company.”

Frank makes a noise of incredulity and wipes his mouth on the hem of his shirt. He doesn't know who Hope is, or if that means something, and quite frankly he's too fuckin’ pissed off to care. “Can't believe I'm gonna pay for your meal after you ruined my night.”

The considered look Cable gives him makes him look away before he feels any heat starting to flush his cheeks, trained and conditioned to salivate on command when Cable fixes him with that thoughtful expression. “I'll make it up to you later. You can sit on my lap in that Lady-forsaken chair and I'll make sure you feel real good.” 

The picture he briefly pushes behind Frank's eyes makes his point crystal clear: Frank, thighs parted and hole full of dick, squirming and panting on Cable's lap. His ugly garbage recliner, of course, tipped back enough that Frank can't move for shit against gravity and the strain on his ribs, forced to lay there on his back as Cable indulges himself, groping Frank’s pecs and stroking his belly, squeezing his balls and pulling his cock in long luxuriant strokes from root to tip. In Cable’s filthy fantasy he catches Frank under his knees and spreads his legs as wide as his hips’ll allow, raw strength and tactile telekinesis easily lifting Frank's bulk so Cable can use his hole just the way he likes, fuck up into him in a way that's explicitly for Cable's pleasure first and foremost. In his head Cable finally makes good on his constant idle promises to thread a delicate push of telekinesis down Frank's piss slit ‘til Frank’s got no choice but to feel Cable in his guts, front and back, consumed completely. 

“Jesus christ,” breathes Frank, as scandalised as he is intrigued and feeling all too public about it.

“Think about it,” says Cable. He cups Frank's face with his hand, cool and dry, resting his thumb on Frank's bottom lip ‘til he darts his tongue out to taste. He looks at Frank burning hot as he pushes his thumb just into the wet heat of Frank's mouth, rocking back and forth over the line of his teeth ‘til he makes a thin noise in the back of his throat. “Think real hard about it,” Cable says again. “Send me a picture when you do.”

“Falafel,” says Frank urgently, taking a step back. Get back on track, he tells himself. Don't think about Cable using him like he's nothing more than a pocket pussy, don't pitch a tent in his paper-thin old sweats because Cable using all that brute physical strength on Frank, like Frank is small and easily handled, makes him feel foggy in the head. “You wanted falafel.”

“With eggplant and garlic sauce,” he says cheerfully, unfairly unruffled by the way he just comprehensively fingerfucked Frank's brain.

Cable turns a wad of Frank's money into a bag of delicious smelling styrofoam boxes without even a token attempt at playing guilty at having forgotten his wallet and, one more nauseating bodyslide later, Frank is silently saying goodbye to the best parking spot he's had in months. He follows Cable’s poor directions ‘til they're at the water, grumbling under his breath when Cable insists on pulling in at a certain spot in the middle of a riverfront dockyard when Frank is already well past the turnoff. 

“You sure,” says Frank doubtfully, knowing full well that Cable isn't gonna change his mind. Frank considers himself an expert on Manhattan’s various shoreline shitholes - the places with good views, the places to eat in peace, the places with no cameras, the spots where he can park up in his van for days at a time without anyone doing anything more intrusive than test the locks and take a piss on his tyres - and this isn’t even close to being one of the premiere shitholes, but Cable has a hair up his ass about parking up in this spot with a view to the barges docked on the far side of the river and, ultimately, what Cable wants is what Frank does.

“Trust me,” Cable mumbles through a mouthful, his kebab already missing a huge bite. “It'll be worth it.”

 _Huh,_ he says, reversing up the road and parking as directed. 

Frank carefully rips back the top of his kebab, a long thin strip of silver-backed paper curling down his hand like a peeled orange. Lamb meat, garlic sauce, heavy on the cheese. It's the first thing he's eaten in days that wasn't foraged from the bottom of his fridge and, as much as he's ticked by Cable dragging him out when he was perfectly content to rot in his chair for another day of healing, it's hitting the spot better than he'd ever give credit for. 

“Radio?” Cable prods at the buttons and spins the tuner uselessly.

“Doesn't work,” Frank says. “Never wired it in. Might be a handheld in the glovebox, have a lo--”

“Close your eyes for a second.” Cable wipes his metal hand clean on his thigh, licks away a lingering smear of hummus. He looks at Frank expectantly, waves _go on_ until he reluctantly puts down his kebab. 

“Don't be a wiseass,” Frank says. Cable is generally considerate about Frank being on a hair-trigger about unexpected body contact, or at least he has enough sense of self preservation to not do anything that might leave him nursing a broken hand and a bruised ego, but Frank figures there’s no harm in reminding him. Cable keeping his hands to himself lets Cable keep his hands, simple math.

“Never,” says Cable solemnly, a sentiment that might’ve carried more weight if he didn’t have a fleck of tabouli on his chin. “Close your eyes for a second. No funny business.”

When he closes his eyes there’s a soft sound, something solid on solid, and Cable says _hmmm_ under his breath. “One second,” he says again. “Just figuring out-- got it.” The same sound again, weight knocking against weight, and Cable says _ta-dah_ with an unduly smug tone in his voice.

When he opens his eyes with as much suspicion as he feels the moment deserves, Cable is shaking out his thick silver fingers and the dash radio is on, backlit dirty yellow and tuned to static. 

Frank looks at the radio and back at Cable, eyes narrowed.

“Don’t be so suspicious,” says Cable airily. “It just needed a jumpstart.”

He opens his mouth and stops, defeated before he even begins. No point, he knows. There is no goddamn point in trying to understand any of this, this… this _mutant_ shit. Cable fixes shitty analogue radios now. Sure, why not? Nothing more difficult to comprehend than him moving things with his mind, or sinuously intertwining his thoughts into Frank's brain at the drop of a hat. Frank _knows_ that the radio was dead in the dash, knows the wiring was clipped at the back panel with a set of blunt wire cutters even before he bought the truck off the side of the road, paid with stolen cash. 

_Too difficult,_ he thinks, and spins the tuner until it settles on some dinosaur station playing the kind of stuff he’d vaguely liked on the cusp of his twenties, back when having opinions about things as ephemeral as music had been important enough to care about. _Too fucking difficult. Don't bother._

“You're thinking loud tonight,” says Cable mildly, his attention focused on the plastic container of dolmades he’s running his thumb ‘round in an effort to pop open.

Frank opens his mouth to hotly deny it, purely on reflex, but instead he checks himself and bites it back down. “I got stuff on my mind,” he says lamely. “You know how it is.”

Cable says _mmhmm_ and tips his head back to deepthroat a tightly rolled dolmade in one go. So sue him for staring, Frank thinks to himself, watching with rapt attention from the corner of his eye as Cable swallows and makes a leoine hum of pleasure before doing it again with the next dolmade. 

“I won't ask.”

Frank can hear the clipped-off question mark at the end of that sentence, giving Frank an out if he uncharacteristically wants to spill his guts. 

“Just wondering why some lunatic forced me to buy him a meal at 2am,” he lies. 

Frank's fairly certain he's never eroticised food before, isn't entirely sure how the process even goes, but for a brief moment he is _intensely_ jealous of the way Cable is sucking the olive oil from his fingers. 

“Told you,” Cable says, swallowing down the last dolma with a cough. He tilts the empty container apologetically in Frank's direction. “There's something you're gonna want to see. You hurt?”

It takes Frank a moment to process the change of topic and he shrugs, resting his kebab on his knee. “Took a few shots to the ribs,” he says. “Back too.”

“You seen a medic?”

Frank shrugs. “No need. S’been six days. I can breath most of the time and I'm not pissing as much blood, so.” He looks out the windshield, watching the sparse late night traffic on the river. “Got enough narco in my place to knock out an elephant if I ever need it. I'm fine.”

“As much?”

Fucking Cable, Frank thinks uncharitably. Of course that wouldn't slip past him. “As much,” he says firmly. “It's healing.”

“Can I see?” Cable turns a little on the bench seat, watching him intently. He holds out his hand, palm up, expectant.

Cable is a considerate telepath, or at least he is where Frank is concerned. Over the time they've been together - working, fucking, both things intertwined deeply enough that Frank has given up on trying to compartmentalise any clean division of labour and pleasure where Cable is concerned - they've managed to set ground rules, made and adjusted and broken and remade through constant trial and error; the times and places and moments it’s acceptable for Cable to go in the dark cluttered attic of Frank’s head, aware of what is off limits (and when is off limits, and who is off limits; a checklist of obscure cross-referencing on a mental map so complex that anyone with smarts would've declared the entire thing unnavigable). 

There are times when Cable is welcome to slip into Frank's brain. When they're fucking he has an open door invitation, more intimate than physically getting inside Frank. He's allowed to look at Frank's fantasies, the things that he can't ask for without a mess of anger and embarrassment and good old fashioned Catholic guilt choking up his throat, an unending library of things to use to make them both feel good. Cable plays around with his nerves, amplifies his pleasure, sometimes goes as far as cutting the signal entirely if Frank is too close to coming and Cable hasn't had his fill yet. 

On a job Cable prefers to unobtrusively ride in Frank's head as they work, two streams of information and experience and intelligence making their firefights short, sharp, and deadly. Cable’s satisfaction at a job well done leaks across their connection, mixing against the cold fury that settles in Frank's guts sometimes, when Cable exposes him to shit so far outside his wheelhouse he might not make it home. Checks and balances, a two-way radio that no one else can eavesdrop on. 

The rest of the time he shields Frank off, filtering his messy discordant din into what Cable describes as background static. There's nothing stopping him from looking at Frank's pathetic middle-aged emotional lurching, but he doesn't, because Cable - for whatever reason - prefers to give Frank his own space in his head. 

He can say no, and Cable won't press the point. Instead he says _sure, might as well,_ and braces his palm against the steering wheel as Cable rests his hand on Frank's shoulder. He slides his palm against the grain of Frank's shirt, metal fingers heavy over the rise of his spine as he gently squeezes the nape of Frank’s neck. Frank lets out a guttural noise before he can smother it down, animal dumb and animal hungry. 

“Don't do that,” he says, throat sticking and making the words come out rough. 

“Shush,” says Cable lightly. He doesn't lift his palm from Frank's neck, just plays with the clippered dark fuzz at his hairline. A corrugation in the metal of his index finger is just deep enough to catch and pull at Frank's hair with every few lazy sweeps of his fingers, and Frank almost misses the gentle pressure of Cable sliding into his head. 

Generally speaking Cable isn't greatly interested in the details of Frank's grim day job beyond names and places, siphoned away to be later compared to his own mental rolodex of shitkickers. Same as Frank in return, maintaining a passing interest in Cable’s sometimes opaque dealings. But, like Frank, there's a mutual interest in each other. Power. Strength. Bloody-minded mastery of what it takes to get a job done. Frank sometimes sees Cable on the news; a few seconds of grainy video of him backlit by raging flame, or Cable towering like a colossus in the background of a press conference in some obscure shithole country, but always over a scrolling tag that starts with the phrase 'international incident’, but Cable prefers to watch Frank up close and in-person privileged by being given the most intimate seat in the house. He treats Frank's head as a personal performance on-demand, permissible memories left wide open and free for Cable to analyse every firefight, every chase, every snapped neck and smashed face.

Some long-ignored piece of Frank says that this should be repugnant, someone so nakedly appreciating Frank’s aptitude for death and destruction and his role in the ruthless theatre of war and murder. The elegant sparkle of spent brass tumbling in the dark, the way spilt blood catches the light as Frank roars in primal rage; Cable admires all of these and replays them in the privacy of his head, turns Frank's savage skills into something almost erotic, a slow-motion sensuous play of red blood and raw meat and the animal pant of Frank's hot breath crystallizing in cold night air.

Frank shifts on the bench seat, fingers tightening on the wheel. The foil-lined kebab bag crinkles as Frank carefully holds it tight on his thigh, his concentration sapped by the stroke of Cable’s fingers, the pin-prick pain of his hair getting pulled. He'll eat it cold later, shovelling congealed sauce and limp lettuce into his mouth with his fingers, straight from the bar fridge in the fourth floor walk-up he's living in this month. He holds it tight ‘cause he doesn't want to drop it all over the footwell, because if Cable keeps stroking his scalp and rubbing his thumb over the hard knob of Frank's spine like he's doing, Frank knows with certainty that he's gonna do something stupid like lean over and unzip Cable’s ugly blue tactical pants and get his mouth on him while the gearshift wears a hole in Frank’s protesting tender ribs.

 _Focus_ , says Cable from within his head, as much teasing as anything else. _Save that idea for later. Show me what happened._

“Laugh it up,” Frank mutters, but obliges anyway. Might as well push it to the front of his head and put his amateur hour fuck-up on display, ripe for mockery. 

“By the Lady,” Cable murmurs sympathetically, eye sparking bright as he grimaces through Frank’s memory of taking a bad fall in an alleyway from a full-speed sprint, his paramedic boots no match for the wet scummy slip of grease and run-off from a bank of old restaurant dumpsters. It was an opening and the men he was pursuing doubled back and surrounded him, kicking him in the guts and back ‘til he found a gap to force to his advantage back, roaring up from the ground and smashing a goon’s nose into his brain with the blunt force of his knee and striking him dead instantly.

Cable _tsks_ in his head, watching a blurry memory of Frank staggering up the stairs to his flop, watching him grimace in the speckled mirror and tenderly press at the livid purple bruises blackening his torso. Frank dry-swallowing aspirin, Frank washing the alleyway grime from his face, Frank letting a low moan of pain as he pisses cloudy red onto the shower floor. 

“Hey,” says Frank. “ _Hey_. Too much.”

“Getting on the ground wasn't ideal,” says Cable, sliding out of Frank's head with a hum. “But, speaking as an impartial third party, it wasn't that bad. Environment changes happen, you came off the back foot quickly, nothing was severely injured. You should see a medic though.”

Frank scowls, takes a half-hearted bite from his kebab. “Told you,” he says through a mouthful of lettuce. “S’healing. Couple more days and it'll be good.”

“And I'm telling you that I'd like you to see a medic,” says Cable, a touch of rigid steel underpinning the kind tone of his voice. “Frame it how you want, Frank. Think of yourself as a tool if that helps. Something that deserves maintenance.”

“Stow it,” he mutters. “If you’re gonna lecture me at least let me stay home for it next time.”

A phantom touch takes Frank by the chin and forces him to look at Cable, mouth set on a firm line as he stares Frank down. “You're hardware,” he says firmly. “You’re equipment. My property, even, if that’s what it takes to get the concept of looking after yourself through your thick skull.” He looks at Frank’s face intently, straight through the forced expression of disinterest Frank is putting on, and smiles crookedly. “Don’t get excited.”

“Fuck _off_ ,” says Frank again, feeling the heat start to spread over his face. “You’re a son of a bitch, you know that?”

Cable laughs at him and says, "Sweetheart, even more than you realise," and slides along the bench seat ‘til he can brace his hand full of kebab wrapper against the wheel and crowd into Frank’s space. Warm metal fingers curl against his jaw and tip up his chin so Cable can kiss him. He kisses him like there's nothing else in the world more important, a thick silver thumb stroking at his cheeks, and Cable kisses the words right out of Frank’s mouth until Frank is soft and pliable under his hands, even as he's telling Cable to eat shit, lips catching against Cable’s stubble.

“Think about it,” he says, and pecks Frank on the lips one last time before he can rise to the bait. “I don’t want my property damaged.”

“Don’t you worry,” says Frank, staring out the window for a moment to get his equilibrium back. “Never gonna cross my mind again.” His face feels like it's on fire. Even though he can’t feel the tell-tale electrical hum of Cable squatting in his head, he’s in no doubt that Cable knows exactly what’s roaring through Frank’s imagination even as he settles back on the far side of the cabin, more interested in getting back into his meal than watching Frank slowly combust.

Fucking Cable. Always going straight to Frank’s weak points, although this is one he at least knew about himself long before Cable ever showed up in his life to root around in his head and upset his equilibrium. 

Objectively he knows he’s a rock solid independent operator, might even be able to revive all his long buried skills at being a good leader if pressed, but there’s _always_ gonna be a part of him that likes being told what to do. Frank is good at taking orders, as long as the person giving them knows how - deserves, even - to haul on his leash. Cable says sit, Frank sits. Cable says beg, Frank begs. Even thinking about being Cable’s property makes a hot feeling roar up his core, painting his face red and making his fists itch.

Frank looks at Cable again, looks at his eggplant falafel slowly collapsing in its wrapper, looks at his big solid hand drumming the beat of some shitty power ballad out on his thigh. Frank knows he shouldn't be staring quite this much. There's nothing wrong with taking a peek at something he wants to look at and he likes looking at Cable all the time, and god knows Cable preens like a showgirl and likes Frank looking at him, but tonight he feels like he's staring like a dumbass teenager with zero subtlety or finesse.

 _Fucking Cable,_ he thinks. _Fucking Summers._

Frank exhales for a long count ‘til his ribs hurt, and unclenches his hand from the steering wheel. 

“You didn't say what you've been doing tonight,” says Frank. He points at his own eyebrow, mirroring the cut that's dried crusted on Cable's forehead. “Big job?”

“Small,” says Cable. “Small but important.”

Frank waits for further elaboration, and when it doesn't come he makes an impatient ‘go on’ gesture. 

“Small but important,” Cable says again, muffled through a mouthful of half-chewed eggplant. “Just like you.” 

“Fuck you,” Frank says, but there's no real heat in it. Another thing Summers will zero on if he gives him an opening. Doesn't matter how he frames it, good or bad, protective or dominating; the fact that Cable stands a head taller than him and makes him feel small by comparison, that he has the strength to physically manhandle him around like Frank weighs nothing… in the right circumstances it makes Frank go stupid, no exceptions, no delay. 

“Not tonight honey,” he says, smirking at Frank's pissy scoff as he reaches back over to press against the thick muscle of Frank’s shoulder, thumb stroking at the frayed sleeve of his tank. “I've got a headache.”

“You’re a headache,” says Frank. He doesn't shake himself free. “A headache and a pain in the ass.”

“Hurtful but true.” 

Cable slides his hand down Frank’s shoulder, his chest, his belly, and comes to rest on Frank's thigh, heavy as a stone. 

“Good?”

“Yeah,” says Frank. “That's good.”

Cable leisurely strokes Frank's thigh, kneading into the muscle as he keeps eating his kebab and nodding along to the music. He jabs his thumb into a spot above Frank's kneecap, really shoves down and pushes until Frank makes a pained noise, a thin little sound barely audible over the sound of yacht rock played through tinny blown-out speakers.

Frank shifts on the bench seat, half restless, half to ease the pressure on his tender back, and all to encourage Cable's terrifying metal hand to slide higher and cup Frank’s semi. 

“Stop that,” says Cable, his tone the cool voice of command that cuts straight to Frank's core. “Take what I give you.”

He tries. He really tries, planting his feet in the footwell and staring straight ahead, thighs tense under Cable’s hand. He fights down the urge to thrust forward when Cable brushes over his balls, masters the urge to grind forward like a teenage boy when Cable drags a thick metal finger over the line of his dick.

The proximity, the push-pull of old fleece, the heavy weight of Cable's hand all serve to get Frank hard. His dick thickens up, hot and heavy, and it doesn't take long ‘til Cable rewards him for good behaviour and drags his palm up Frank's thigh to cup him firmly, fingers wrapped 'round his shaft.

He squeezes him and rubs him, cups his fingertips over Frank's balls and smoothes his thumb over the dime sized wet spot staining the fabric dark at the tip of Frank’s dick.

“Frank,” says Cable. His hand stills on Frank’s leg as he smiles to himself and opens his eyes, finally. “Lemme jack you.”

“Is this what you wanted to show me,” Frank asks dumbly, and snaps his mouth shut with an audible click of his jaw. “Coulda done this at home.”

Cable winds down the window enough to drop the last of his meal onto the dock and turns on the bench seat enough that he can watch Frank shove his sweats down enough to free his dick. No need to offer twice. Frank might still be a bit floaty from the painkillers and Cable's stupid teleporting trick, but it'll be a cold day in hell before he’ll turn down anything Summers cares to give him, even a dry hand. Might take him a bit to get hard, but Cable has him conditioned well with just the right look, the right touch. Cable says beg, Frank will get hard and dripping and sit up for a treat, even if he's gotta drag himself through hell to get there first. 

“Hands off,” Cable says, a thread of telekinesis pulling Frank's hand off his dick, pumping himself fast. “Let me,” he adds, unbuckling and sliding over the bench seat so that they’re sitting side by side, close enough that Frank can feel Cable’s body heat, breathe in the smell of stale sweat and old cologne and burnt ozone; a reminder that he’d been on the job before showing up in Frank’s kitchen, eager enough to see him that he hadn’t stopped to even wash up. He rests his hand in Frank’s lap, squeezing feather-light as Frank starts to drip wet and smear over his palm. “I've been thinking about this for days.”

“Bullshit,” says Frank. He abandons his kebab on the dash over the steering wheel, closing the wrapper just enough that he's not gonna have hummus leaking everywhere. 

Cable laughs at him. “Days,” he says, stringing the word out. “Big dick like yours, Frank. Wanna jack you off every morning and suck you dry every night.”

“The offer is open,” says Frank distracted, already entranced by the way Cable’s massive hand engulfs his cock, a smear of precum shining glossy and wet against the the lustrous sheen of moving metal. “In that order.”

“Yeah?” Cable squeezes him gently. “Is that what you want?”

He’s halfway through replying _whatever you feel like_ when Cable slides back on the bench seat and folds himself in half. He barely mourns the loss of those fantastic terrifying threatening fantastic fingers before he’s weakly saying _oh fuck, oh fuck_ like an idiot as Cable swallows him down ‘til he’s pushing his broad nose into the thick bush of Frank's pubes, moaning like he's the one getting his cock sucked sloppy and wet. 

He rests his hand on Cable's neck, palm over the puckered line of metal biting into flesh. Cable's hair is thick and wiry against Frank's thumb, shining bright even in the dim light through the truck window. He sucks Frank without making it sweet or easing into it. He shoves as much of Frank into his mouth as he can, his tongue a rippling hot pressure as he gags and swallows and changes his angle to suck at him slow and leisurely, lips soft. 

His eyes are closed and Frank stares at the way Cable’s dud eye glows through the thin skin of his eyelid, inhuman and foreign. That sight used to get him squirrelly; an unmissable sign that he was indulging in something with someone so very different to Frank, someone more physically powerful, sure, but someone with an advantage that Frank had no access to. A mutant, literally advanced on Frank's mere humanity. 

Dangerous, yes. A threat, yes. None of that puts him off any more - the risk, the fear - and he refuses to think about what that means. Not now, not ever.

“Jesus,” he says. “Shit, you're good at this. Anyone told you that?”

 _You're worth the effort,_ Cable says in his head. _I love sucking you off._

He laughs weakly, leaning back against the headrest and closing his eyes, savouring the feel of Cable giving him a world class messy blowjob. “Any time,” he says. “You say the word.”

Cable makes a pleased noise, hums in the back of his throat and purrs in Frank's head. _Don't promise things you can't deliver._

 _Not a problem,_ thinks Frank shakily. He thinks about Cable on his knees, back to a wall, weapons discarded by his side. Bare warehouse brick, dirty subway tunnel concrete, rattling tin sheeting. His hands in Cable's hair are dirty and stained, grease under his nails and blood on his knuckles, holding him down as Frank fucks his mouth until Cable coughs and gags around him, spit spilling down his chin and down his shirt. He imagines finishing on Cable's face surrounded by the evidence of their destruction. He's fantasised about it plenty of times since that night Cable first blew him after a job, sweaty and anticipatory and wreathed in the burnt ozone scent of spent hard light rounds. He wants to thread his fingers into Cable’s hair and splash thick ropes of cum across his broad face, let it track down Cable's cheek, watch it gleam in the reflected light of his dud eye as it drips down his chin and smears on his collar. 

The approval of his daydream forms like a lazy **_!_ ** in Frank's head. _Go ahead,_ says Cable, shrugging his shoulder ‘til Frank takes the hint and slides his hand into Cable's thick silver hair. He hums in approval and says _good girl, my good girl_ when Frank pulls at his hair a little, holds him back just enough that he can shallowly rock into Cable’s eager mouth. 

“Harder,” Cable says, kissing Frank's cock delicately, tonguing at the fragile split of his piss slit like he's frenching him. The rasp of his tongue makes Frank hiss between his teeth. “I have it on authority that I'm hard to break.”

“I can't,” he says, and laughs at the ridiculousness of it all. Any other time he'd leap on the invitation to use him; to pull Cable’s hair so hard that he could feel the coarse thick strands break in his grip, really go to town driving his hips up in short sharp snaps, knock against the back of Cable's mouth and use him just like Cable's offering. He can't though, not now, not with his ribs already complaining at the way he's slouched on the seat, every heavy breath he takes ‘cause of Cable’s fantastic goddamn mouth being answered with a sharp twinge of pain. 

Typical. Normally of the two of them Frank is the one starving to drop to his knees, desperate to get his mouth around Cable's perfect dick and swallow every inch that he's given, but the _one_ time he’s content to selfishly use Cable's mouth he's hampered by his own physical restrictions. 

_Poor thing,_ Cable says in his head, and he sounds so genuine that Frank cuts off the snide denial that's on the tip of his tongue before he can say something to ruin the mood. _My pretty girl all banged up and alone._

He can hear Cable’s considered pause, even as he’s sucking Frank off like it’s his privilege and his prize. _So maybe not the chair then._

The fantasy from before, Frank pinned on his back and split on Cable's cock, briefly sparks up in his imagination before frittering away into nothingness. 

“Put a rain check on it,” says Frank distantly, petting the ropey scar tissue over Cable's spine and watching the way Cable’s cheeks hollow as he sucks him. Frank rubs his thumb against the grain of Cable’s unshaven three-day stubble, groans appreciatively as Cable hums in satisfaction. 

_There are alternatives,_ Cable thinks teasingly, mouth full of dick. _I can treat you nice._

A room somewhere, pale timber and cool bright walls. Frank gets a vague impression of big sunny windows framing pine trees and snow. Cable lingers on the sight of Frank on his back, relaxed, sinking into a mountain of pillows against a blonde wood bedhead. In Cable's imagination Frank looks less worn out, less hard around the eyes, the sour downturn of his mouth softened into something more appealing as he gasps and groans without catching himself. 

Cable offers up a picture of himself riding Frank, moving with lazy rolls of his hips as he fucks himself slow and steady, powerful thighs flexing on each stroke. Soft sunlight catches all that gleaming satiny metal as he pinches his nipple and palms the nape of his neck, just like Frank is doing right now, just how he knows Frank likes to look at. 

“Maybe,” says Frank, pushing lightly at Cable's head. “Shit. This is what we do now? Think stuff at each other instead of actually doing it.”

Cable laughs for real at that, pulling off Frank's cock before he can choke. “That's an option too,” he says with a chuckle, turning his face enough to blot his chin on Frank's sweats, spit turning the thin cotton a dark incriminating grey. “I've seen inside your head,” he says. “Things you want but can't do.”

He gives Frank a long considered look, somehow dignified despite being bent up like a pretzel with his head knocking up against the steering wheel. “You're a little too… infamous, I guess, for some of the things I know you want.” Cable pauses to spit on his palm, slicking the metal before he starts jacking Frank. “Maybe twenty years ago my lovely wife could be tied down in a motel room, a free hole for anyone who wants to use it--”

“Shut the fuck up. Jesus.” 

“--or the thing with you on your knees, stood on.”

Frank breathes in deep at that one, heavy enough to make his ribs hurt enough that he holds a hand to his side. He's _never_ shared that one with Cable, not deliberately. 

“Not deliberately,” Cable agrees, the corner of his mouth turned up in an almost-smile. The light spilling from his dud eye sparks and snaps, reflecting on Cable's thick metal fingers, gleaming in the wet mess of spit and precum smeared all over Frank’s cock. 

The image swims up in Frank’s imagination unbidden, entirely of his own volition. Always the same, unchanging: Frank dressed and on his knees, hands behind his head, fingers locked together and knuckles blanched white as he holds himself up. Knees kicked wide, a heavy boot pressed over his fly as a crowd gathers around. Elbows up, tits pushed forward, lit unforgivingly bright from above so everyone surrounding him can watch Frank pant like a dog and beg and squirm ‘til he cums in his pants with a moan. 

“I saw you that time you got arrested in Times Square, d’you know that? It was on the news. I remember watching it in an airport lounge. Ten years ago, was it?"

“Thirteen,” says Frank, distracted by the way Cable is playing with his foreskin, stroking it back and forth then pinching it between gleaming metal until Frank makes a plaintive noise. 

“I remember thinking, ‘so that's what he looks like.’ I'd never seen your face before, only read about you.” Cable pauses to lick his thumb and glances up at him slyly. “And now I know the real thing is so much better than any mugshot I’ve seen on tv.”

He cuts Frank off before he can do anything more than take a breath, swallowing him back down with a moan. 

This time he feels Cable’s interest burn up molten hot, heat licking through his belly and creeping along his bones as a picture insinuates itself at the front of his mind, hazy ‘round the edges and flooded with too much colour. Frank sees himself, head tipped back in Cables palm, his eyes red with reflexive tears beading on his lashes. He sees himself on his knees, thighs spread, worn jeans showing off the incriminating dusty boot prints all over his thighs and zipper and pressed over the solid weight of his dick, wet at the tip enough to an incriminating damp spot. He looks defiant and stubborn even as Cable strokes his cheek and pets his hair and insinuates his booted foot ‘tween Frank’s thighs, close enough that his laces kiss against the straining seam of Frank’s trousers. Close enough that Frank could arch up and rub himself off like a dog, but only he gives in. _Come on,_ says Cable in his head, thumb resting on Frank’s lip, such a soft touch compared to the mess stomped in all over Frank’s dick. _Show everyone how good you are._

“Fuck,” breathes Frank. “ _Shit.”_

 _Say the word._ Cable looks up at him through his lashes, dud eye gleaming like liquid gold, cheeks hollowed as he sucks Frank obscenely slow from root to tip. _I’ll try anything once, safe in your head. I'll make you think every screen in Times Square is broadcasting you squirting in your panties like a raw virgin if that's what you want, sweetheart._

Frank swears under his breath and closes his eyes, willing himself not to bust then and there. He rubs his fingers into Cable’s hair instead, trying - and failing - to rock up into his mouth. He gets a few short thrusts in before his ribs twinge and his back twists, and he lets his head fall back onto the headrest with a frustrated grunt.

The words, _you've got two hands,_ helpfully float up in Frank's head. 

“You sure,” says Frank, already knotting his fingers into Cable’s thick hair. This, too, is part of the game they've made with each other, the back and forth, offering an out. Cable doesn't do anything he doesn't want to do, doesn't offer an option if he doesn't like the choices he's offering. Frank can fuck his mouth and pound his throat raw and leave Cable coughing and gagging and wiping a snotty mess all over his face, but only because Cable puts it in the table. 

It shouldn't feel like a treat, being meted out Cable’s little boons like he's a dog being rewarded for faithful behaviour, but it is. God, how it is and god, how much he hates it and god, _god,_ how much he loves it. 

Cable pushes against Frank's hands enough to lift his head, licking his lips. His mouth looks flushed dark in the dim lighting thrown by the yellow lights outside, his chin wet with spit. “What's the time?”

It takes a long moment for his question to percolate through the blowjob-induced fog in Frank's head and he blinks dumbly, mental loading time gone extra long. “The what?”

“The time. I forgot my watch.”

“Quarter past two. Why?”

“Exactly quarter past or nearly quarter past?”

“It’s. Shit. 0216. What does that have to do with--”

Whatever answer Cable might have had is lost, abandoned for the maddening wet heat of his mouth as he sucks at Frank, tonguing his piss slit and moaning like he's the one getting blown. 

_Hands,_ he reminds Frank. _Fuck my face._

“Yeah,” says Frank, staring at the window at nothing, his attention wavering down to a single focal point. He scratches his nails against the curve of Cable’s scalp, tugs at his coarse silvery hair. “Just, uh, slap me if you gotta.” 

He pulls him onto his dick nice and gentle, getting a feel for it, being polite. Cable braces his hand on Frank's thigh and digs in his fingers, five metal points pushing into muscle. When Frank uses him rougher the pressure on his thigh eases up, when he offers a breather it returns, digging down hard enough that Frank knows he'll have a bruise to look at tomorrow.

Just the thought of examining the marks from Cable's hand sets a pleasurable dirty thrill in his gut. Frank's got no real affection for bruises, more a daily hazard than anything special, but there's something about wearing a physical reminder that Cable's been on his body - that he's used him, moved him, left his mark on him - that quiets the rabid mangy dog in his head for a while. Every dog wants to be owned, even just for a little while.

“Show me tomorrow,” says Cable. He rubs his cheek against Frank's shaft, looking up at him as he kisses his dick open-mouthed and wet. The scrape of his stubble feels like torture, pure hell against the thin sensitive skin. Cable does it again and smirks when Frank moans and his cock twitches and pearls up a fat drop of precum, hating the scratch and loving the burn in equal amounts. “Send me a picture,” he adds. “Give me something to look at it.”

“You've got an eyeful now,” Frank manages to point out, and pinches at the sensitive ropey skin on Cable’s neck when he laughs at him. 

“I want something to look at when I'm away,” says Cable matter of factly. “I want to look at you.” He points his tongue and traces the thick vein snaking up the underside of Frank’s dick, and presses an open mouthed kiss to the taut bowstring of his frenulum. “There's only so much mileage I can get out of my imagination and my hand,” he adds, and cuts off any possible rebuttal by sucking Frank down with a self-satisfied hum. 

Frank opens his mouth then closes it again, brain checked out for good this time. 

Fucking Summers. The idea that Cable devotes any kind of attention to Frank outside of their assignations does a whole lot more for him than he cares to admit. He's always operated under the assumption that Frank falls off Cable’s radar as soon as they part ways, compartmentalised away cleanly until Cable requires his skills and, subsequently, thinks of the benefits Frank is clearly too eager to bring to the table.

“Christ,” he says, dragging his attention to the huge bulk of Cable twisting himself up into knots for Frank's benefit. He's always been nakedly appreciative of Cable’s size, the sheer mass of him towering a head taller than Frank, his shoulders as broad as axe handles, strong enough to go toe-to-toe with Frank and win. Not too many people on this earth can make Frank Castle feel small, but the way Cable fills a space tall and commanding - the way he boxes Frank against a shitty flop-house mattress, the way he backs him against a wall, the way he crowds Frank against the door of a shitty cousin-fucker pickup just so he can pull Frank's sleep-stale sweats down and suck his dick like it's his entitlement - makes Frank feel light in the head. 

“Christ,” he says again. “Jesus and fucking Mary.” He groans, grinding Cable’s nose into his thick bush of pubic hair as he chases his orgasm, moaning at the fantastic maddening feel of Cable's throat as he chokes on him. 

He throws his head back against the headrest, the cracked vinyl squeaking in protest. “Shit, Summers. I'm gonna come.”

Cable sucks back a wet breath and, so fast it makes Frank’s head spin, he opens his mental floodgates and gives Frank what he really wants: all the noise and feedback and static of Cable’s mind and body roaring into his head like a searing hot flash, like a bomb going off, like a shockwave pressure wall slamming through him from the bones outward. 

He chokes ‘cause Cable is choking. He fights the urge to gag ‘cause Cable is fighting the urge to gag. Frank licks at the corner of his mouth to sooth a split that isn’t there, feels the prickle of hair being torn out that isn’t his, and when Cable says _come on hurry up I need you to look up sweetheart I need you to look across the river_ he does.

Frank stares at nothing and chokes on nothing and then he sees it. The shipping yard across the river heaves, the sagging dock flexing in slow motion like ripples on a pond, and then it explodes.

The sense of self-satisfaction that booms from Cable’s brain, a great big booming peal of noise tolling like a church bell, is enough for Frank. He comes and comes hard, cum flooding Cable’s eager throat and smearing down his chin as Frank gawps open-mouthed at the far side of the river and watches it cease to exist.

The shockwave hits the truck first, a wall of pressure that sways the chassis before the noise of the explosion rolls over them and a wall of heat follows.

The massive fireball unfurls slowly and elegantly, a ball of gold and red heaving under a halo of black lace. The explosion paints the clouds bright for a brief moment, reflecting down to the river and the city, bright enough to make Cable’s hair ‘tween his fingers look as golden angelic as a saintly portrait as he sucks him clean.

“Jesus,” Frank says, out of breath. He pants shallow, as much trying to keep his ribs from screaming in pain as he is trying to not suck back a lungful of hot air. “What the _fuck,_ Summers. Did you do that?”

Painted by the golden light filling the cab, Cable's smile gets a little more animal, shows a few more teeth. “2:20AM, on the dot.”

“That’s you?” Frank looks back across the river, watching the wooden dock start to seriously burn, the fast-moving flames fuelled by decades of ground-in oil and grease. “This is what you wanted to show me?”

Cable sits up with a grunt, hauling his bulk upright and square on the seat. He wipes Frank’s cum from his chin and sucks his fingers clean, radiating an almost unbearable aura of smug satisfaction.

“Assholes,” he says, pleased. His blank eye gleams, cold flames kissing the air. “You know that family you've been tracking, the Tigurinis? They started dabbling in stolen Krakoan goods. Burn in hell.”

“Jesus.” Frank closes his eyes as he fumbles with his sweats, shoving himself away still spit-wet. He’s been chasing the Tigurinis for months, slowly pruning the branches of their family tree one piece at a time, siphoning away their money and resources hit by methodical hit. “Who was there?”

“An emergency meeting,” Cable says, running his tongue over his teeth. He raises his arm expectantly and raises an eyebrow at Frank. When he doesn’t oblige him Cable slides over and, carefully broadcasting his motions, wraps his arm ‘round Frank’s shoulders. “All hands. The old man, the full family, their capos, and more than a few of their soldiers. They’ve been worried that someone with a grudge and a lot of weaponry was after them.” He pauses, thoughtful. “They were technically right.”

“I’ve been waiting for them to call a meeting for months.” Frank wills himself to relax under the weight of Cable’s blood-warm metal arm. Up close he smells incredibly good in a way that, any other time, would go straight to Frank’s brain _if_ he hadn’t just pumped his load down Cable’s throat. Sweat and warm cotton and muscle balm and faded cologne, under a delicate wreath of freshly spent hard light rounds. He breathes it in ‘til his ribs ache. “How’d you find out this was happening?”

Cable shrugs. “I gave them a push. One of their most trusted righthanders came to a meeting thinking he was scoping a buyer for a Krakoan delivery that went missing in transit six months ago. He met me instead.” He stretches and nods at the raging inferno starting to take the entire dock. “The right thought pushed into someone’s head at the right time can make a lot of things happen.”

“Wait.” Frank pushes himself free enough to turn and look at Cable, brows furrowed. “They’ve been moving mutant shit?”

“Krakoan medicine mostly. Very profitable sideline to their current imports.” Laboratory drugs, experimental hallucinogens, opiates a thousand times stronger than Fentanyl. These were the things Frank knows about, having followed the string of deaths in northern New York back to the source by diligent research and a lot of broken fingers. Mutant goods hadn’t been mentioned once. “I believe they also got their hands on a couple of experimental weapons from Skitch’s supply when someone sank one of our fleet last month. He builds in enough failsafes that I don’t think they’d ever be able to use them, but you know me. I’m a completionist.” Cable shrugs and gestures for Frank to slide back across the bench seat. “When I clean house I like to leave it _sparkling_.”

“In interest of fairness the Hellfire Trading Company has said they would like to offer you a finder’s fee,” Cable continues, big fingers settling on Frank’s arm and squeezing his bicep for good measure. “The line was something like ‘hard work for the benefit of mutantkind shouldn’t go unrewarded.’ They have three hundo untraceable ready to be wired to you. I’ve also got a file with all the Tigurini contacts to give you once I finish up and debrief back on the island.”

“Pretty sure you just gave me a hell of a reward,” Frank mutters, not feeling quite as put-out as he’s making himself sound. “Shit. I didn’t even know they were on your radar.”

“Politics,” Cable says apologetically. They’ve had this discussion before, the ebb and flow of Krakoan politics, mutant politics, the endless push and pull of Cable moving through both worlds on perpetual grim clean-up and how Cable manages to fit Frank into his complex always-moving political puzzle. “It’s always politics. But like I said, the nation of Krakoa is very discreetly grateful to you and will point-blank reject any knowledge of you if pressed.”

Frank laughs, a wheezy bark of noise. “Sure. Very discreet I bet.”

“‘No friend ever served me, and no enemy ever wronged me, whom I have not repaid in full,’” says Cable, hitting the words imperiously. He shrugs at Frank’s incredulous stare.

“Really? You're tossing history quotes at me now?” 

Cable shrugs sheepishly. “Sometimes Emma Frost is very, _very_ compelling.” He looks at Frank intently, his serious expression lit by raging flames and the cycling flash of distant emergency lights. “You good?”

Frank closes his eyes for a long second. “Yeah,” he says eventually, squinting at Cable. “You saved me a lot of ammo.”

“I did,” says Cable, pressing his lips to Frank’s temple in a dry kiss. Across the river a dozen fire trucks jockey for access to the riverbank, the warehouses already gutted by raging flame and the yards on the verge of collapse. “Want to go?”

“Probably should,” he says, sliding out from under Cable’s thick arm and feeling for the keys in the ignition. “Better split before they start looking over the water for eyewitnesses.”

“Officer, I didn’t see a thing,” says Cable with theatrical innocence, looking out the windshield. “I was too busy sucking dick.”

“Christ almighty,” Frank says exhausted, double checking his headlights are off before shifting gear into reverse. He adjusts the rear view mirror and backs out of the yard, every pothole jarring his back. “I bet you’d make that work for you too.”

“Nothing wrong with telling the truth.” Cable waits ‘til they're at the next set of lights to reach over and rest his palm against the grain of Frank's shirt, working his metal fingers heavy over the rise of Frank’s spine and gently squeezing the nape of his neck. “You’re going to go see a medic.”

“Don't drag an injured man out when he's trying to sleep,” he fires back. “You owe me a meal.”

“Look after my property,” says Cable says, ignoring him. “Don't neglect my favourite things, Frank.”

“Fine,” says Frank, grateful that the late night city lights are probably hiding the heat that rises on his cheeks. “Fine, okay. I'll go to the Night Nurse tomorrow. You want a medical certificate too?”

“No, I want my wife fit enough that she can let me break that godawful recliner.” Cable scratches his fingertips through the fuzz of Frank's hairline. “Is that incentive enough?”

 _Absolutely_ , thinks Frank, though he'd rather pull out his own teeth than admit it. “You know I gotta find a park now, right? You're a headache and a pain in my ass.”

“As before, that's hurtful but true.” A pause, silent, as they idle at the lights and wait for a single pedestrian to cross. “Send me a picture of your bruises tomorrow.”

“Come inspect them yourself,” says Frank before he can talk himself out of it. “Bring something to eat with you. Fuckin' text first.”

He reaches over and flips the radio back on, pointedly not thinking about how that came to be, and tips his head forward a little. Cable takes the hint and strokes higher up the curve of Frank’s skull, looking out the window and humming to himself as he does so. 

Frank can’t help himself. “Times Square, huh?”

When he glances over Cable is smiling serenely under the passing streetlights, dud eye dimly reflecting off the passenger window. “If that’s what you want,” he says, and looks over at him. “Whatever you want, Mrs Summers. I’ll make it happen.” 

**Author's Note:**

> I have a garbage comix blog where I post bad content all day, every day. [@stryfeposting](http://stryfeposting.tumblr.com).


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